Already There
by starfishstar
Summary: Remus returns to Tonks, and Remus and Andromeda have a conversation.


**Notes:** There can be so many versions of this moment in Remus and Tonks' life; here's one. Also, I've long wanted to write a conversation between Remus and Andromeda – the two titans of my fanfiction world – so I'm very pleased this happened! On some subconscious level at least, this story was definitely inspired by stereolightning's lovely recent story "Chrysalis."

It's a bit unclear – "Deathly Hallows" makes it sound like Remus left Tonks for weeks, Pottermore implies it was mere hours. I lean toward believing the former (when in doubt, book canon trumps Pottermore supplementary canon!) but I've left it a bit vague, so you can interpret it how you choose. Also, I can't find any evidence for when exactly Ted goes on the run, so here I've assumed he's still living at home. Oh, and this story draws on my own headcanon for Remus and Tonks, that they had a complicated up-and-down relationship starting in "Order of the Phoenix," rather than the Pottermore version in which they didn't get together until the end of "Half-Blood Prince."

There had been some shouting, and some silence, stony but brief, and now they were sitting across from each other at Tonks' parents' kitchen table. Andromeda and Ted had discreetly retreated, Remus had to give them that – they were lovely people, both of them, and also understood when their presence would not be helpful.

"I went to see Harry," Remus said, into the silence that sat between him and Tonks, a heavy presence in the room. She looked at him and listened. Even after all of this, she was willing to listen. "He said some things to me that made me very angry, but pretty soon I had to admit that he was right."

Tonks nodded as though this didn't surprise her. "What did he say?"

"Essentially, that parents should never abandon their children if they can possibly help it. And that I should take it from an orphan who knows."

To his surprise, Tonks' response was a sigh.

"Remus, don't be here out of obligation," she said. "I can manage on my own, if it comes to that. I only want you to be here if you want to be."

"I do," he said. "I so very much do. I only – I thought–" He broke off. She'd heard all his reasons. She didn't need to hear them again. "I'm sorry."

"I know you are."

He couldn't tell if there was absolution in that, or only weary acceptance of things about him that never seemed to change. He would mess this up, and he would be so desperately sorry, and then he would mess it up once again. He had returned to her – for good this time, if she would have him – but still that voice in the back of his head said, _Why would she want that? What good can you possibly do?_

"I'm so sorry," he said again, hearing how raw and hoarse his voice sounded, as if he'd spent all day shouting. He hadn't, so far as he knew. If he had, it was only inside his own head.

"Remus, I know. You don't have to keep saying it."

"I don't know what else to say."

She nodded, as if conceding a fair point.

"And I don't know how to show you that I mean it," he said.

She nodded again. "Yeah. I don't know either."

"Just tell me what you need," he said, his voice barely making it past a whisper. "Tell me what you need, and I'll do that."

She tried to answer, but an enormous yawn split her face. "I'm – oh, Merlin, Remus. I'm so tired. I don't even know. Can we continue this conversation tomorrow? Actually, this seems like a conversation we're going to be having for a long time to come. I'm glad you've come back, but – can we do this tomorrow? Right now, I haven't got the energy."

"Of course," he said. "I can go, I can come back again tomorrow, if you want–"

She shook her head. "Stay here."

"I'll sleep on the sofa."

"No. _Stay_ here. With me."

He hadn't even dared to touch her yet. He couldn't imagine sharing a bed.

As if she'd read his thoughts, Tonks reached out across that great, nearly insurmountable distance, across the table, and took his hand. Her palm was warm and reassuring against his. "Remus. Stop it. Whatever you're doing there inside your head, beating yourself up, quit it. I'm angry with you – I'm really, really hacked off, in fact – but we'll figure this out. So, if you say you want to do something for me, then _don't leave_, all right?"

He swallowed hard. "Yes, all right."

She nodded and let go of his hand, then eased her way out of her chair, looking as though she felt a little nauseous. He knew that her morning sickness – inaptly named – often carried over into the evenings.

"I'm going to bed," Tonks said. "You can come up if you want. You know where my room is."

He gazed up at her, the love of his life, with hair that was messy and short and blonde today, and a weary face. That sight – Tonks just being herself, being Tonks – was something he wanted to look at every single day of his life.

He wanted to tell her that, and didn't know how.

"I'll come up later," he promised. "Right now, I can't – I don't feel I could sleep. I'd only keep you up."

"Suit yourself," she said, but there was no harshness to her words. She stood there and looked at him a little longer, as if she were contemplating some more tender gesture – a hand resting on his head, perhaps even a smile – but in the end she only nodded again, and turned and left the room. Remus heard her going up the stairs, her steps measured, not her usual enthusiastic gallop.

He bowed his head over the table, staring down at his own hands where they splayed against the wood, and acknowledged all the ways he was responsible for making Tonks walk in a way that sounded sad.

When Remus looked up again, Andromeda was standing in the kitchen doorway, looking at him, her arms folded.

"You'll understand," Andromeda said, her expression neutral, "that I remain sceptical about your ability to carry through on your promises this time."

"I understand," Remus said, without hesitation. "All I can do is try to show that I mean what I say. And that's what I plan to do."

Andromeda nodded, as if she would expect no less.

Remus had always found Andromeda impressive, even intimidating. Clever, insightful and unafraid to tell Sirius when she thought he was acting foolishly, which had been a lot of the time – those were words Remus would once have used to describe Andromeda. And that was when she had been nothing more to Remus than the older cousin of his friend, a casual acquaintance. Now that they shared this commonality – the same person they both cared more about than anyone else in the world – Remus couldn't help but find her a little terrifying. Andromeda knew just how badly, and repeatedly, Remus had let Tonks down.

"Well," Andromeda continued briskly. "I'm glad you've come back, at least."

Remus couldn't help but ask. "Are you, though?"

"Remus, I don't dislike you, whatever you may think. And Nymphadora is so happy that you're back. It's hard for a mother to argue with that logic – my daughter is happy."

"She doesn't seem happy," Remus said, or perhaps admitted, because this was exactly his fear, that his presence would only make worse the damage he'd already done.

"Perhaps not," Andromeda said. "But comparatively speaking, she is. Very."

That she had been here to see just how devastated Tonks had been by Remus' abandonment remained unspoken.

"Listen, Remus," she said. "I could threaten you, or say any number of unpleasant things, but what would be the point? Your heart knows what it wants. All that's left is for you to follow it."

Remus stared up at her, disbelieving. "After all this – after everything I've done – all you have to say to me is that I should follow my heart more?"

Andromeda leaned her head against the doorframe beside her, contemplating him. "Yes," she said.

Remus could almost have laughed in surprise. He felt that laugh welling up in his throat, in fact, but he quelled it. It didn't seem the appropriate response.

"Andromeda–" he tried, and couldn't think what to say. He stood, because it seemed strange to remain seated so long when she was standing. "You've allowed me into your home, when you would have every right to turn me away, and shown me far more understanding than I deserve. What can I possibly say?"

"Oh, Remus," she said. "Go upstairs to your wife."

Remus studied her face, and thought about all the aspects of Andromeda he didn't usually take the time to contemplate – that she was a Black, when all was said and done. That she had left the family, just as Sirius had, but unlike Sirius, she hadn't left out of anger. She'd left out of her love for Ted. They must have struggled, Andromeda and Ted, to find a path they could walk together, and it must have sometimes seemed impossible.

"Yes," Remus said softly. "I think I will."

And Andromeda granted him a rare smile.

She stepped back so he could pass, those penetrating eyes still watching him. Mostly Remus found that if Tonks resembled either of her parents, she resembled Ted, but there was something in Andromeda's clear-sighted gaze that was hers, too.

"Good night, Andromeda," Remus said from the foot of the stairs. "Thank you for – everything."

She only nodded, and turned away towards the sitting room.

Remus climbed the stairs and made his way to Tonks' childhood bedroom door, which stood slightly ajar. He pushed it open, cautious, quiet. The room inside was dim.

"Remus," Tonks said, voice clear and awake, though he'd tried to step over the threshold silently.

"Hello."

He heard her shift in the darkness, making room in the narrow bed. "Are you coming to sleep, then?"

"Yes," he said.

He closed the door beside him, crossed to the bed and undressed beside it, carefully undoing his belt, shedding his shirt and trousers and setting them aside, feeling his way in the dark. Tonks said nothing, watchful and listening. He sat on the edge of the bed.

"Dora," he said.

"Too tired for discussions, Remus," she said, calm but firm. "Get in bed or don't, up to you."

He slid in next to her under the covers, close but not touching. She shifted closer, her back mostly turned to him, but reaching back to find his arm and bring it around her waist. Remus shivered.

They stayed like that, their sole point of contact the spot where her T-shirt rode up slightly and half of his hand rested against the warm skin of her stomach. Tonks wasn't asleep, Remus could tell that from her breathing.

"I just had an odd conversation with your mother," he said.

"Occupational hazard of living under this roof," Tonks replied. There was a thread of amusement in her voice, slim but present, and Remus gratefully grasped onto that.

"Aren't you curious what she said?"

"Oh, I suspect she was wise and inscrutable," Tonks said. "And she either gave you a good talking to, or more likely _didn't_ give you a talking to, and made all the more of an impression for that."

"Something very much like that," Remus said, amused and impressed by her spot-on assessment of her mother. Well, it was her own mother, after all. She'd had years of experience.

"Come closer," Tonks said, and so Remus dared to lean in and press a soft kiss against the side of her neck. She arched up towards him, and he kissed the same spot a second time. When they settled again, they were closer together, his chest to her back, his knee against hers.

In the dark, again, he dared. "I want to fall asleep like this every night for the rest of my life," he said against her neck, his voice rough with the longing of it.

"Good to know," Tonks murmured. He hadn't expected her to answer the sentiment, hadn't in the least intended that she should respond in kind, but a moment later, she added, "Me too."

"Really?"

"Yes, really. Tomorrow, mind you, we're going to have a seriously long conversation about where the hell we are now, but yes. Really."

She shifted closer against him, and he wrapped his arm around her more tightly. "I want to be there for you," he whispered. "And for the baby, of course, but first of all for you."

"Remus," she said, finding his hand where it rested against her skin and covering it with her own. "Stop worrying. You're already here."

. . . . .

**Edited to add:** Now with a sequel! Remus and Ted have a conversation the next morning: "Go On, Try."


End file.
